Video: Pawlenty calls for end of ethanol subsidies — in Iowa

posted at 5:30 pm on May 23, 2011 by Allahpundit

Ed touched on this earlier, I know, but it deserves a post of its own. Man, if the “boring” candidate in the race is willing to be this bold in front of the hometown crowd, I can’t imagine what the “exciting” candidates will do.

The early read on this move is that it’s a smart play for him politically. I agree with that — from a macro standpoint. But there are people who will tell you that Pawlenty has no chance if he doesn’t finish strong in Iowa, in which case … is his campaign now DOA?

Pawlenty is, in theory, strongly positioned in Iowa. He’s from a neighboring state, he’s been working it on the ground, and as an evangelical, he has the right profile to appeal to social conservatives there. “He has real credibility on the social issues and a faith testimony that will resonate among the grassroots,” a prominent social conservative says.

Yet there’s potential trouble on the launching pad. Rep. Michele Bachmann is also from Minnesota and has a strong bond with social conservatives and tea-party backers. Her fundraising machine, even before it’s ginned up during a presidential run, is formidable. If she gets in, she could easily steal Pawlenty’s thunder in Iowa and deal a severe blow to his candidacy.

A Republican donor who supports Mitt Romney puts the most dire spin on it: “There is no plausible path to the GOP nomination for Pawlenty absent a win in Iowa. Thus, Bachmann poses an existential threat to T-Paw.”

I can picture three scenarios where T-Paw wins the nomination after losing Iowa. One: If Palin or some other grassroots candidate with a real chance to win the nomination jumps in and takes the state by storm, the GOP establishment will panic and might rally behind Pawlenty before New Hampshire on the assumption that only he has a chance of beating the Iowa winner in South Carolina. Two: If Pawlenty earns the endorsements of enough prominent establishment conservatives — Mitch Daniels, Haley Barbour, Jeb Bush, etc — it could boost his profile to the point where he comes back to win indie-minded New Hampshire no matter what happens in Iowa. (Given Romney’s huge fundraising advantage, T-Paw might not be viable without those endorsements anyway.) Three: Huckabee could endorse him before Iowa, which might lock up enough social conservative votes to undo any damage from his ethanol heresy. All of those scenarios are dodgy, though; he’s taking a huge risk, needless to say, by giving a hard dose of fiscal reality to a crucial state he’s actually well positioned to win, especially now that Huck’s out. Ace is right that if Pawlenty goes on to lose the caucuses, he can now spin the defeat not as a case of him underperforming but of having been punished for being a truth-teller. But that’ll be a cold comfort when he then has to move on to New Hampshire to face Romney, who’ll have spent a ton of money there, and Huntsman, who’ll probably be camped out there for the better part of the next eight months.

That said, like most of you (I assume), I respect him more today than I did yesterday, which of course was the whole point of this move. T-Paw’s macro strategy here is straightforward: He needs to balance his appeal to the center as an electable, non-bombthrowing Republican with his appeal to the base as a conservative who’ll stand fast for core principles as president. His argument on the first part of that was already solid — Huntsman is too far to the center to win the nomination, in all likelihood, and Romney has all sorts of baggage that could keep too many base voters home in the general election. His argument on the second part is weaker, especially if a grassroots favorite like Palin jumps in. Forced to choose between someone like T-Paw who seems more electable but less confrontational and someone like Palin who’s perceived as the opposite, many base voters will opt for the latter on the theory that they’d rather stick with someone whom they know will fight for principle and let the electoral chips fall where they may. Pawlenty’s ethanol gambit forces them to rethink that by posing the following question: If he’s willing to confront Iowa voters about their little ethanol gravy train in the name of fiscal responsibility — even though his candidacy probably depends on winning the state — then who wouldn’t he be willing to confront? He’s got guts. I’m not so sure about his risk-assessment skills, but he’s playing to win. Click the image to watch.

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After all the comments from everyone here that T-Paw is boring, you know, I thought that he would actually be you know really boring but when I heard him today for the first time, I thought that perhaps he had a “sex change operation” based on what you guys kept on saying…..!!

What is the standard for a non-boring candidate now? An Al Franken look-alike….??!!

You must all have liberal brain implant that are saying Pawlenty is boring?! Anybody that has a pull-up-from-bootstrap story is interesting in my book and I think to most other sane-thinking people.
Mcguyver on May 23, 2011 at 7:52 PM

T-Paw is, as Ed put it this morning, hyper-competent. Which is what we need to defeat incompetence in Nov. ’12.

I asked him about his perceived toughness, since this will be a long, hard slog. Don’t confuse politeness with weakness, Pawlenty told me, listing his battles with the Democratic legislature and the transit workers’ union. He shut down the government here over a budget fight, for instance, and issued a record number of vetoes. Not surprisingly, Pawlenty says that Republicans should look for a candidate with a strong, successful executive track record for the best possible contrast with Obama.

Careful Timmy, you’re starting to look like your average,
run-of-the-mill, finger in the wind, tell-ya’ what will advance my career, politicians. If you get that label stuck to you, it’s nearly impossible to get it off.

Pawlenty, who reportedly coined the term “Sam’s Club conservative” to describe his political philosophy, has been an economic populist and big-spender generally. Among other things, he:

* Supported government subsidized health care for all children as the first step toward universal health insurance, and opposed President Bush’s veto of a Democratic bill that would have expanded the State Children’s Health Insurance program (SCHIP) to families earning as much as $83,000 per year;
* Supports Massachusetts-style health care reform, including a “health care exchange” and an individual mandate;
* Has called for banning all prescription drug advertizing, and seeks government imposed price controls for drugs offered through Medicare;
* Proposed a $4000 per child preschool program for low-income children;
* Pushed a statewide smoking ban smoking ban in workplaces, restaurants and bars;
* Increased the state’s minimum wage;
* Imposed some of the most aggressive and expensive renewable energy mandates in the country;
* Was an ardent supporter of the farm bill;
* Received only a “C” ranking on Cato’s 2006 Governor’s Report Card, finishing below such Democrats as Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack and tied with Democratic Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell.

“Now, that is nonsense, because we have the domestic solutions here, and John and I will adopt the all-of-the-above approach to meet America’s great energy challenges.Yes. Those hundreds of billions of dollars being re-circulated here in America, that means harnessing alternative sources like the wind, and the solar and the bio mass and the geothermal and the ethanol, and we’ll develop clean coal technology. And we’ll drill for the billions of barrels of oil that we have right now warehoused underground included our resources offshore. We will drill here and drill now, and now’s when you chant, ‘Drill, baby, drill.'”

Makes no sense for him to do be against ethanol subs – it would be safer politically not to do so.

He’s running for Prez which makes it more impressive.

rickyricardo on May 23, 2011 at 9:58 PM

Pawlenty signed legislation mandating that all gas sold in Minnesota contain 20 percent ethanol by 2013, up from 10 percent…. In 2005, Pawlenty also urged other states, at a meeting of the Governors’ Ethanol Coalition (which had 31 member states at the time), to mandate that all gasoline contain 10 percent ethanol by 2010.

The ethanol “subsidy” isn’t really a subsidy, but a tax credit.
ramrants on May 23, 2011 at 6:12 PM

Notice:

sub·si·dy/ˈsəbsidē/Noun
1. A sum of money granted by the government or a public body to assist an industry or business so that the price of a commodity or service may remain low or competitive.
2. A grant or contribution of money.

Farmers receive money from the federal govt through farm programs to PLANT corn.
I know of a farmer who is going to plant corn on land that abuts next to some of ours. The govt is going to pay him $600/acre to plant it, whether it grows or not.
Concerning farm subsidies for crop in general, the government pays you on established acres. Whether you farm it or not. So you get X aomunt of money bcs of the base acres you have that have a history of an established crop.
Like for instance, on our land somewhere are like a few acres that they offer to give us ‘free’ money for: $80/yr. They’re probably wheat acres.
We don’t farm.
So this is NOT a tax credit.
IDK what you are talking about.

Far as ethanol subsidies, farmers loooooove them.
So many farmers I know, & I’m surrounded by them,love their government gravy train.
They pi$$ & moan about Democrats doing this & that, but yowl the loudest when you talk about getting rid of their government payments.
There are all kinds of these types of government programs in agriculture where the govt pays you $$$ to do this & that.
Many of them are cost share programs. Like they’ll pay so much of the cost for planting a shelter belt etc.
I can’t tell you how many farmers make it a full time job gaming this system.
It would really pi$$ you off if you knew the extent of it.

LOL!
If T-Paw ever supported ethanol to the extend he seems to have, he was obviously shilling for his base. MN is FULL of farmers.
Every farmer I’ve ever known has never turned down their crop payments.
I’m all for getting the feds out of agriculture.
Why are we paying corporations to farm?
WHY?!

Far as ethanol subsidies, farmers loooooove them.
So many farmers I know, & I’m surrounded by them,love their government gravy train.
They pi$$ & moan about Democrats doing this & that, but yowl the loudest when you talk about getting rid of their government payments.
There are all kinds of these types of government programs in agriculture where the govt pays you $$$ to do this & that.

They pay the farmers pennies on the dollar to flood the world market with corn. which results in cheap corn based food products, diabetes, obesity and pollution.

Ask your corporate giant buddies at Cargill and ADM and their lobbyist that flood the halls of Congress.

rickyricardo on May 23, 2011 at 11:04 PM

You evidently jest.
Bcs those f$%^&%$ are not my ‘buddies’.
In ND it is against the law for corporations to own farms.

They pay the farmers pennies on the dollar to flood the world market with corn. which results in cheap corn based food products, diabetes, obesity and pollution.

rickyricardo on May 23, 2011 at 11:06 PM

Just so you know-corn is not cheap right now.
Neither is wheat or sunflowers.
In fact,this ethanol subsidy scheme has made corn very expensive.
Most farmers I know are doing very well if they aren’t buried under a mountain of debt.
I have a neighbor who should not farm bcs he’s terrible at it.
And yet after engaging in various farm program schemes, he’s coming out rosy cheeked.
New pickups & semi trucks & stuff everywhere!
Bunches of new grain vacs & augers galore!
We’re talking at least several hundred thousand $$ worth of new equipment.
To a farmer who is a failure.
So these farmers are not getting pennies.

Careful Timmy, you’re starting to look like your average,
run-of-the-mill, finger in the wind, tell-ya’ what will advance my career, politicians. If you get that label stuck to you, it’s nearly impossible to get it off.

Most of that is attributable to the Dem controlled legislatures he had for 8 years.
We gotta face it, two of the more competent executives in the race were governors of blue states. They’re going to have what looks like some dirty laundry to a fairly conservative audience. We need to figure out whether either of them would be true conservatives if they weren’t shackled by blue majority populations and Dem legislatures.

Most of that is attributable to the Dem controlled legislatures he had for 8 years.

That sad excuse is Romney’s excuse as well.

We gotta face it, two of the more competent executives in the race were governors of blue states. They’re going to have what looks like some dirty laundry to a fairly conservative audience. We need to figure out whether either of them would be true conservatives if they weren’t shackled by blue majority populations and Dem legislatures.

2ipa on May 23, 2011 at 11:32 PM

The answer is no because in case you haven’t been keeping up, Washington DC is addicted to pork. They are far more leftist than what you will find in Minn. or Mass.

If they are being rolled by Democrats at the state level why do you imagine they will suddenly become lions at the national level where it really gets nasty? You think Reid or Pelosi are gonna play nice?

So are you suggesting it is OK for the federal govt to subsidize farming?

Of course. Study some history as to why the Feds began it in the first place.

In From the 20’s until 1933 the bottom fell out of the farm commodities business. None of the grain elevators were buying and folks were losing farms left and right. So the subsidies in the Depression days were done to encourage the farmers not to plant.

Why?

To rescue farmers from the disastrous effects of growing too much food—far more than Americans could afford to buy. The market system sucks in the farming biz because crop surpluses collapse prices but where will the bankrupt bankrupt farmers be when they are needed again when the inevitable lean years return.

This is more or less what New Deal farm programs attempted to do. For storable commodities such as corn, the government established a target price based on the cost of production, and whenever the market price dropped below that target, the farmer was given a choice. Instead of dumping corn onto a weak market (thereby weakening it further), the farmer could take out a loan from the government—using his crop as collateral—that allowed him to store his grain until prices recovered.

At that point, he sold the grain and paid back the loan; if grain prices stayed low, he could elect to keep the money he’d borrowed and, in repayment, give the government his corn, which would then go into something that came to be called, rather quaintly, the “Ever-Normal Granary.” Other New Deal programs, such as those administered by the Soil Conservation Service, sought to avert overproduction (and soil erosion) by encouraging farmers to idle their most environmentally sensitive land.

It worked fine…until the 70’s when Butz blew up the program for the worst.

Of course. Study some history as to why the Feds began it in the first place.

In From the 20′s until 1933 the bottom fell out of the farm commodities business. None of the grain elevators were buying and folks were losing farms left and right. So the subsidies in the Depression days were done to encourage the farmers not to plant.

Why?

To rescue farmers from the disastrous effects of growing too much food—far more than Americans could afford to buy. The market system sucks in the farming biz because crop surpluses collapse prices but where will the bankrupt bankrupt farmers be when they are needed again when the inevitable lean years return.

This is more or less what New Deal farm programs attempted to do. For storable commodities such as corn, the government established a target price based on the cost of production, and whenever the market price dropped below that target, the farmer was given a choice. Instead of dumping corn onto a weak market (thereby weakening it further), the farmer could take out a loan from the government—using his crop as collateral—that allowed him to store his grain until prices recovered.

At that point, he sold the grain and paid back the loan; if grain prices stayed low, he could elect to keep the money he’d borrowed and, in repayment, give the government his corn, which would then go into something that came to be called, rather quaintly, the “Ever-Normal Granary.” Other New Deal programs, such as those administered by the Soil Conservation Service, sought to avert overproduction (and soil erosion) by encouraging farmers to idle their most environmentally sensitive land.

It worked fine…until the 70′s when Butz blew up the program for the worst.

rickyricardo on May 23, 2011 at 11:56 PM

You know, things are different these days.
We sell a lot of our food overseas.
I understand that the federal govt has an interest in maintaining a food supply. I consider it a national security issue.
Unfortunately, the govt is too involved in the decisions at the local level & that is why this has gotten out of hand.
What started out as a way to maintain stable food prices became a monster.
Farmers should not be getting paid by the govt to farm or not to farm.
As far as soil bank, I don’t have a problem with its intentions.
But farming has really changed & producers have more incentive to do those things on their own bcs it allows them to produce more & more efficiently.
CRP now sets the price for crop & grazing land.
The feds are affecting what I pay for pasture rent.
They need to get OUT of the business.
Now crop payments are so high that they let their CRP contracts expire to take advantage of fed crop payments over fed CRP payments.
It’s a circus.
The govt needs to get out of it altogther.
See, that’s the way these programs are. They start out meaning well, & perhaps they do some good at 1st, but then when they should be cancelled, done away with, they remain & then start to DESTROY.

Livestock farmers in Iowa will like phasing out ethanol subsidies.

golfballs03 on May 24, 2011 at 8:23 AM

As a rancher in SW ND I can tell you I want them GONE.
I think it was 2009, a bunch of fellow ranchers lost their a$$e$ bcs of corn.
Now prices are impossibly high.
We did really well this last fall when we sold calves.
The market guys who predict cattle prices are in no man’s land right now bcs cattle prices are high & so is corn.
I cannot imagine these cattle prices can remain this high.
We ranchers are worried about consumers turning to other forms of protein.
I feel lucky to have 980 lbs of meat in my freezer.
I feel bad for the people who want a hamburger & have to pay $4/lb for hamburger in the store.
It’s unsustainable.

Ethanol isn’t a bad option, but we don’t need to subsidize them. Just let them hit the free market. There is money that could be made. They don’t need the subsidy unless the government starts limiting the amount of corn that can be produced like they do with wheat.

If consumers are paying for subsidies to keep food and energy cheap, is it really cheap? Or has the cost just been hidden?

hawksruleva on May 24, 2011 at 9:16 AM

There are certain crops that would be very much more expensive for you to purchase if it wasn’t for subsidies. Like wheat. Right now there is a shortage of wheat and will be worse after this year, but the government does not allow all the wheat land to be planted.

As Governor, he did push “Renewable Fuels” with mandates for their use. In the debate in SC he addressed that issue more or less head on. That is his flip flop. Compared with Mitt or Newt that isn’t so bad.

There are certain crops that would be very much more expensive for you to purchase if it wasn’t for subsidies. Like wheat. Right now there is a shortage of wheat and will be worse after this year, but the government does not allow all the wheat land to be planted.

Voter from WA State on May 24, 2011 at 9:45 AM

The terrible weather everywhere in the heartland is going to cause a huge spike in prices in corn, wheat, etc. later on.
Here in ND, many have not even planted yet.
It’s too wet.
And I’m talking the SW corner.

The answer is no because in case you haven’t been keeping up, Washington DC is addicted to pork. They are far more leftist than what you will find in Minn. or Mass.

If they are being rolled by Democrats at the state level why do you imagine they will suddenly become lions at the national level where it really gets nasty? You think Reid or Pelosi are gonna play nice?

sharrukin on May 23, 2011 at 11:40 PM

He owned the dem Legislatures for 8 years. The only time they got a tax increase through was when 6 RINO’s helped overturn his veto. Once. You obviously missed my two points-
1) He’s elected by the blue voters, not the Legislature.
2) You can’t govern if your not elected. Even Reagan lost Minnesota.